Grave
by manic
Summary: The dead soil the earth.


Well, this is my little foray into the Marriage Law Challenge on WIKTT. Should be a pleasant little ride. Notice the title.  
  
Grave  
  
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Graveyards are bumpy. The headstones, the crypts and most of all the grass, it was a landscape filled with hidden traps. Hermione walked between the rows, limping a bit. Not from an injury from the war, but because she'd just tripped over a bump in the perfect green covered ground. So there it was, survive the war and break an ankle on the way to visit a grave.  
  
Well not "a" grave. The graves. The ones of the fallen, too many to bury, too many left to rot, and too many who's bodies were simply incinerated in the final frenzy of spells that left a scorched earth and arid scent in the air. The scent was probably the worse. It lingered in the nostrils like burnt meat. It was burning fat. The flesh of those that were simply gone, the only reminder a horrid odor that never left. Despite the showers, the perfume, everything she had tried, she had not been able to rid herself of the scent. In her lighter moments she thought it was sense memory. Then she would step outside and she would curse the fact that it wasn't a memory. The earth leaked blood and flesh and still reeked of the battle fought upon it.  
  
It was all she could do not to weep at the sight of the world.  
  
It should always be raining, Hermione thought as she trudged along, head down, trying not to misstep again. Anyway she turned it, her ankle hurt. She didn't want to stop. Somehow, the thought of stopping to cast a quick spell seemed disrespectful, the dead would haunt her for being so trivial and weak as to not be able to stand a little sprain. Then again, the dead didn't have to lurch around the grounds trying to find some sure footing. She bowed to the inevitable and bent down and as quickly as she could cast a numbing spell on her ankle. Not a cure, but enough to get her through the next few hours.  
  
As short as her stop was, it was still enough to halt the morbid procession she was in. Harry and Ron both stopped ahead of her and waited. Ron seemed on the verge of running towards her before Harry restrained him with a hand. That was before the annoyance took hold. No one in the party seemed to want to prolong this little excursion. This trip to visit the dead, it was Hermione thought, all about respect.  
  
Respect for those that lived, those that died and those who simply were gone. The wards of Saint Mungo's were filled to the brim with witches and wizards that watched as their loved ones died. Death Eaters tortured them into oblivion or they'd just given up. Too much of everything, denial, death, destruction, horror, they'd chosen to go into their merry little worlds of insanity that no potion, spell or curse could remove.  
  
Cowards.  
  
At last their motley band of mourners reached the tribute sight. The grass beneath their feet gave way to raw earth. The soles of their shoes and boots slid in the mud that bubbled up from the ground. It was as though the dead were crying and the earth wept at the sound of it. Without thought, Hermione brushed away the tears that ran down her face to the view the monolith that stood before her.  
  
Erected by the last burst of power from Albus Dumbledore before he fell, the stone stood fifty meters high and its circumference was at least half that. Hermione still tired each time she tried to walk around it. She'd never once made it. Halfway through, a quarter of the way around she'd see a name, remember a face, or simply not have the energy to continue. Wasn't it enough that she'd lived? Now week after week she'd made this gory trek through the graves of the ages to this latest spectacle of death. It was a memorial to the dead, the dying and the disappeared. Week after week, now months after the final battle names appeared on the surface as more succumbed to their injuries. It was a roll call for the survivors. They lived on, they were the ones that made it through. They were the strong. The meek did not inherit the earth, they became the earth and their decaying bodies fueled the rise of the structure. It was a growing testament to the cost of war.  
  
Hermione had had enough of it. It was time to live. Speaking of living, she walked around the stone, leaving the others to track the names to the spot she never failed to glance at. Her heart sunk at the empty space. Once again the name had disappeared. Severus Snape: betrayer, savior, traitor, horror and monster.  
  
Why couldn't the man stay dead?  
  
end part one 


End file.
